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Residents who live near Salem Hospital‘s main campus have won the latest round in their battle to keep executives of Salem Health, the hospital’s parent company, from demolishing the last remaining building of the former Oregon School for the Blind campus.

Salem Health officials planned to go before the Salem Historic Landmarks Commission next month and seek permission to demolish Howard Hall, a former boys’ dormitory. However, Salem senior historic planner Kimberli Fitzgerald said they have withdrawn their request.

Representatives of the health care provider last month issued a request for proposals to find developers or renovation professionals who might have a new use for the structure. The deadline for submissions is Aug. 23.

“The hospital looked at various ideas for adaptive reuse, but they really couldn’t find anything that met their needs,” said Clark Worth, a spokesman for Salem Health. “The purpose of this process is to see if there are other people who might have ideas. We’re in the middle of that process now. The RFP is out there, and we’re waiting to see what comes in,” he said.

Fitzgerald said the proposal to destroy the 90-year-old building raised a din from neighbors that was impossible for Salem Health official to ignore.

“They heard loud and clear from neighbors that they want to see the building adaptively reused,” she said.

Fitzgerald added that she is uncertain about the extent of the response – if any – to Salem Health’s RFP.

“They’ve worked really hard to put it together, this RFP,” she said. “Let’s just say it’s tough out there.”

Jon Christianson, one of the neighbors fighting to save Howard Hall, said he has his fingers crossed. A presentation by officials on Aug. 6 did little to assuage his apprehensions, he said.

“It’s a wait-and-see,” Christianson said. “They carefully withdrew their application before the landmarks commission made a formal decision, but I still didn’t have a sense that was conclusive, that the building was going to be preserved.”

Salem Health officials for more than two years have proposed demolishing the building to accommodate a $20 million expansion of their existing campus.

Their first appeal to the landmarks commission was rejected in 2011. The decision was predictable, Fitzgerald said.

“We have a very strict code in this city when it comes to historic preservation,” she said.

The former Oregon School for the Blind was designated as a historic area. However, only Howard Hall was specifically protected by the landmarks commission in 1990.

Salem Health officials demolished the school’s playground and its other buildings, and added a chain-link fence around the entire facility.

The Oregon School for the Blind opened in 1873 on eight acres slightly north of Mission Street and south of Pringle Park. The 2009 Legislature cut funding for the school and put the property up for sale the following year. Salem Health officials bought it for $6 million.

The surrounding neighborhood itself is historic, Christianson said.

Conde McCullough, an engineer who designed many bridges along the Oregon Coast, lived across the street from the school campus. Pioneering landscape designers Elizabeth Lord and Edith Schryver lived three houses away.

“The historical milieu is very rich,” Christianson said.

He said he is more concerned about Howard Hall’s preservation than its reuse.

“I think any use that’s compatible would be fine,” he said. “I don’t have any preset use in mind. I just want to see the sanctity of the site preserved for the blind community and people who know the contribution of the school to the state of Oregon.”

That contribution is considerable, Christianson added.

“It really speaks to the heart and quality of Salem as a community,” he said. “I hope the hospital has a sense of responsibility of what they have in their hands and realize they are part of a larger continuum of care that includes not only individual patients but the life of the community where those patients live.”

The RFP can be downloaded at Salem Health’s website at .